Use faster shutter speeds, use flash to freeze your subject, or just shoot in better light.

4. Flash reflected off Glass

This is the all-too-famous blotch of white light that you see in airplane windows, in aquariums and offices.

REASON:

Flash bouncing off the glass and back into the camera’s lens.

FIX:

When shooting in to glass, remember not to shoot perpendicular to it if using flash. If possible, turn off your flash, else, if you have a camera with a lens that sticks out, go right up to the glass so that the lens is almost touching the glass itself, and then take a picture. That way you wont get reflections of your flash!

5. Flare

White diffused area next to a light source, or circles of light radiating out from a light source that’s directly in the photograph’s frame.

REASON:

Light that comes directly into the lens sometimes does not get absorbed, but bounces off the surface of the lens. The best lenses have great coatings to reduce this, but a cheap filter most certainly will bounce light.

FIX:

Use a lens hood to keep stray light out, get a lens with better coatings, Dont shoot directly into the light.

6. Vignetting

Dark edges in a photograph

REASON:

Light that is focussed by the lens starts falling-off towards the edges.

Filters on a wide-angle lens infringing on the corners of the frame

A Low quality lens

FIX:

All lenses have some degree of vignetting. The expensive ones just have less.

Don’t use filters that need step-down ring adaptors

Some cameras like the LOMO use low quality lenses intentionally. If you don’t want a vignette, don’t use them.

@Caledonia: I second that… So do the guys at LOMO… They’ve made a following out of it! But sometimes its nice to let Photoshop take care of it in the post processing. Especially when you dont want it to become too apparent.

[…] Quick-Fix Guide to Common Photography Problems Beyond Phototips Here’s a short list of problems that you may encounter on your journey of discovery in photography, along with an equally short list of fixes to get you back on the road. […]

@Simon: Are you sure the sky was not that blue? or maybe the guy who printed them for you loves deep blues, and pushed the saturation on it. Can’t really tell just like that. The situation usually takes a bit more inspection.